India reported a record daily jump of 7,964 new Covid-19 infections yesterday, with a recent surge in cases as lockdown restrictions start to be relaxed.
The country has recorded 173,763 Covid-19 cases and 4,971 deaths, making it the ninth most-affected country globally.
While fatality rates in India have been comparatively low, experts warned that the pandemic’s peak has not been reached as new infections are increasing.
Officials are nervous about the pandemic spreading through villages as millions of jobless migrant workers return home from cities.
Rights activists and the opposition have criticised Modi’s handling of the pandemic, accusing him of announcing an abrupt lockdown that left the poor in the lurch and forced thousands to walk or jostle for space on buses and special trains to reach home while fearing infection.
More than 100 migrant workers have died either in accidents or due to starvation as they tried to return to their villages, the home ministry official said.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare said said the doubling time of Covid-19 cases has improved to 15.4 days in the last three days, while the recovery rate has shot up to 47.40%.
According to a statement issued by the ministry, a total of 11,264 Covid-19 patients have been cured in the last 24 hours, the highest in a single day.
As many as 82,369 patients have been cured of Covid-19 till now.
“The doubling time in the past 14 days was 13.3, which has improved to 15.4 in the last three days. The fatality rate is 2.86%. As on May 29, there were 2.55% active Covid-19 cases in the ICU, 0.48% on ventilator support and 1.96% on oxygen support,” the ministry said.
According to a senior ministry official, the recovery rate has increased by 4.51%, from 42.89% to 47.40%.
“Owing to the high number of recovered patients, the number of active cases has also declined from 89,987 on Friday to 86,422 presently.
All the active cases are under active medical supervision,” the ministry said.
It said the testing capacity has increased in the country through 462 government and 200 private laboratories.
“Cumulatively, 36,12,242 tests have been done so far for Covid-19, while 1,26,842 samples were tested on Friday,” said an official.
There are 942 dedicated Covid-19 hospitals with 1,58,908 isolation beds, 20,608 ICU beds and 69,384 oxygen supported beds in the country.
lTamil Nadu yesterday reported a record 938 new coronavirus cases over the past 24 hours, taking the total tally past the 21,000-mark to 21,184.
In a statement, the Health Department said the new cases included 82 returnees from other states and countries.
The statement said six Covid-19 patients died, taking the state’s death toll to 160.
Stranded migrant labourers walk to an assembling centre to get transferred to a railway station to board on a special train to Bihar, in Chennai yesterday.
